“New twist on the Cold War between Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss in battle for the crown of Boris” – Paul Routledge

Chancellor Rishi Sunak and Secretary of State Liz Truss eye prime minister’s price, says Paul Routledge, but both still have a problem…

Mariupol, Kharkiv, Irpin, Sumy, Lviv, Kyiv and Kherson…

The names of Ukrainian battlefields become as well known as Somme, Coventry and El Alamein.

As the war entered its second month, world leaders gathered in Brussels yesterday to intensify the fight against Russia’s onslaught on democracy.

Here another conflict took a new turn: the Cold War between Secretary of State Truss and Chancellor Sunak over the successor to Boris Johnson.

The risky Rishi spent much of his supposedly wasted spring budget talking about Ukraine and parking his tanks on Liz’s lawn.

And his promise of a 1p income tax cut ahead of an election in 2024 was red meat Tory MPs have been accused of helping to boost his shaky ratings.

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Loopy Liz is attempting to trump the prime minister with increasingly bellicose rhetoric, accusing France and Germany of selling out Ukrainians and denouncing peace talks as a pretext for Putin.

This is the foreign minister who didn’t know that Voronezh and Rostov-on-Don are in Russia, not Ukraine. And confused the Baltic Sea with the Black Sea, 700 miles away. Someone should buy her an atlas.

In the Liz v Rishi psychodrama, she comes across as amateurish alongside her rival, who now poses as Chancellor for Workers and Families.

The truth is that none could inherit the crown. Boris Johnson glued it to his thatch with superglue.

Rumors in Westminster said he would bravely fly to Kyiv, the besieged capital, but it turned out to be fake news, much like the man himself.

A town not half Brad

Bradford has been shortlisted to be the UK City of Culture in 2025.

Fair dos to the other three – Durham, Southampton and the Welsh borough of Wrexham – but I don’t think they can compete with the home of JB Priestley, David Hockney, the Brontes and Saltaire, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Not to mention (but I do) the curry capital.

Bradford has struggled for decades, with massive cuts in public spending and most recently the cancellation of Northern Powerhouse Rail.

A jury led by Sir Phil Redmond, creator of Brookside on Channel 4, will announce the winner in May. Fingers crossed for woolopolis.

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Homeless man Christopher Cornish, 31, demanded £10 from his wheelchair in a raid at Taunton’s KFC store in April 2019.

He pretended to have a gun, but the fearless staff refused to pay and locked him in the toilet.

Justice finally caught up with the one-legged desperado this week when he was charged with racketeering for six months at Exeter Crown Court.

Call me soft, but I don’t think jail is the right answer for delinquents like him.

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Russian scammers reached top government ministers, including Priti “Hopeless” Patel, through secret phone lines.

“Hello, is this the Home Secretary’s private office? Pavel Routledgski here, Prime Minister of Ukraine!”

“I’ll put you through, sir…”